A theorist, organist, and conductor, Jeff Ostrowski holds his B.M. in Music Theory from the University of Kansas (2004), and did graduate work in Musicology. He serves as choirmaster for the new FSSP parish in Los Angeles, where he resides with his wife and children.

“Iconographic tradition has theologically interpreted the manger and the swaddling cloths in terms of the theology of the Fathers. The child stiffly wrapped in bandages is seen as prefiguring the hour of his death: from the outset, he is the sacrificial victim, as we shall see more closely when we examine the reference to the first-born. The manger, then, was seen as a kind of altar.”
— Pope Benedict XVI (2012)

HAT IS POLYPHONY? How does it incorporate ancient plainsong melodies? Our eyes could better see that if we looked at the original part books. In the following example, I have superimposed the original plainsong melody (“Vexilla Regis”) onto Palestrina’s part books from 1589AD.

Do you see how all four voices enter with the “Fulget crucis” plainsong melody?

To use melodies in this way may seem—to those who don’t know very much about counterpoint—a simple task. Nothing could be further from the truth. Composing in such a way is like trying to solve a massive Rubik’s Cube; when you try to complete one line, it has an effect on all the work you’ve already done and messes it up.

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